Commentary: Nato is in danger of becoming a broken alliance

Show of force: military vehicles and a jet on display at Celtic Manor golf course next to the hotel hosting the Nato summit

David Cameron faces a perfect storm in an area he has tried to avoid, strong in his belief that foreign policy rarely affects general elections.

He now has one Briton threatening to murder another on video somewhere in the Syrian desert, in the name of the Islamic state. Slowly, he is being pushed to use military force in Iraq and possibly Syria, with the backing of his friends in the Nato alliance.

That alliance has other things on its mind, starkly illustrated by the agenda for its 65th major summit — opening today in Newport. There the leaders of the 28 Nato partners have to decide how to deal with Vladimir Putin’s activities in Ukraine.

It has to reassure its members nearest the fire, Poland and the Baltic states, as well as the Kiev regime, yet it must not provoke Putin further. Mention of more warlike exercises could tip things over the edge to full-scale war involving western armies. And there is a lot of Nato business left over from Afghanistan plus the increasing instability of the Mediterranean region, just to add two more headaches to the list.

Many members are prepared to contribute only minimum military muscle and funds. One of the most important tasks for the Nato leadership — France’s Hollande and Germany’s Merkel particularly — is to stop it slipping from a dysfunctional to a broken alliance.

This will mean money. Only the US, Estonia and Greece spend the notional two per cent of GDP or above on defence. Under present calculations the UK will go down to 1.7 per cent of GDP under current MoD budget plans; as we grow out of recession defence funding is not moving up at the same rate. Mr Cameron could and should fix that.

The dilemma posed both by Islamic State and Putin in Ukraine is the role and employment of force in the diplomacy in the world of the global economy. Too often politicians and commentators talk about deployment of forces, when they really mean employment. And the potency of force is latent, as much as kinetic.

The main objective with Putin must be to allow him an escape route, and talk him down from his aggressive nationalist rhetoric. Islamic State requires an action plan for the short and long-term, both with the object of limiting and then writing down its power.

Force will have to be used, though building up the local armies of the Kurds and Iraq will take the kind of time we don’t have left. It means, as ever in the Middle East, getting down and dirty — talking to Iran and Assad’s military dictatorship.

The alliance has to show that it is not just a minus sum of its parts — but has a collective capability relevant to today’s real global threats.